Tips for minimizing database growth

Long-lived processes store process data in the AEM forms
database. The growth of the AEM forms database can be minimized
using a few easy process design and product configuration strategies.

Process design tips

Use short-lived processes whenever possible. Short-lived
processes do not store process data in the database. The disadvantage
of using short-lived processes is that their status and state are
not tracked in administration console and there is no history of
the process.

Some service operations, such as the Assign Task operation (User
service), require that they are used in long-lived processes. In
this case, you can segment the process into several subprocesses
and make them short-lived when possible. If you use this strategy,
short-lived subprocesses should handle large data items, such as
document values.

Use variables sparingly. When using long-lived processes, for
every process instance, space is allocated on the database for each
variable in the process. Strategic use of variables can save a considerable
amount of space. For example, you can overwrite variable values
when old values are no longer needed in the process. And delete
any variables that you have created and are not using. You can validate
the process to find unused variables.

Use simple variable types (for example, string or int) and avoid
using complex variable types when possible. Database space is allocated
for variables even when they do not contain a value. Complex variables
typically require more space than simple ones.

Product administration tips

Use global document storage (GDS) effectively. The GDS
directory on the forms server is used to store, among other things,
files that are passed to services that are part of AEM forms in
processes. To improve performance, smaller documents are instead
stored in-memory and persisted in the database.

administration console exposes the Default Document Max Inline
Size property for configuring the maximum size of documents that
are stored in-memory and persisted in the database. (See Configure general AEM forms settings.)
If you set this property to a low value, most documents are persisted
in the GDS directory instead of in the database. The advantage is
that you can more easily delete the files when they are no longer
needed when they are stored in the GDS directory.